On Mon, Aug 3, 2009 at 9:34 AM, Matt Plahtinsky<[email protected]> wrote:
> Here is a list of some of my most used tools.

  Many of those are on my list, too.  :-)

> GParted Live - Resize partitions
> http://gparted.sourceforge.net/livecd.php

  I use SystemRescueCD (http://www.sysresccd.org/) which includes
parted, gparted, and a bunch more.

> HDClone Pro - Hard Drive cloning tool
> http://www.hdclone.com/

  PartImage and ntfsclone, two partition imaging/cloning tools, are
also included on SysRescueCD.

> JKDefrag-3.36/MyDefrag-4.0 - Hard Drive Defrag program
> http://www.kessels.com/Jkdefrag/

  New website: <http://www.mydefrag.com/>

> Sysinternals - An sysadmin's best friend
> http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinternals/default.aspx

  Indeed.  In particular, Process Explorer.  Stop guessing why someone
is complaining "my computer is slow" and actually *know*.

> Lua BugLight - For finding out where a program hangs with it run under
> restricted mode.
> http://blogs.msdn.com/aaron_margosis/archive/2006/08/07/LuaBuglight.aspx

  Newer release:
<http://blogs.msdn.com/aaron_margosis/archive/2008/11/06/lua-buglight-2-0-second-preview.aspx>

> Belarc Advisor - Audits installed software, list keys, hardware, Microsoft
> patches, ect and generates a report.  *** this tool is for home use only
> according to their website ****

  Using Belarc Advisor for business purposes is a violation of their
license agreement.  I presume you like to be paid for the work you do,
and get mad when clients stiff you on payment.  Perhaps you should
extend the same thoughts to your suppliers.

> DBAN - Securely wipes hard drives to DOD standards
> http://www.dban.org/

  FYI, current DoD standards do not permit software-based destruction
methods.  But DBAN is still a useful tool for wiping "business data".

> If you have some tools that you use a lot please share.

  All "free" tools:

UnxUtils
Common Unix commands  and utilities, ported to Win32
<http://unxutils.sf.net/>

Notepad++
Lightweight but full-featured Windows-style text editor
<http://notepad-plus.sourceforge.net/>

7-Zip
All purpose archiver/compression tool
Handles most archive formats (PKZip, RAR, MSFT CAB, many SFX EXEs,
tar, gzip, etc.)
<http://www.7-zip.org/>

WinDirStat
Very good disk space usage visualization tool
<http://windirstat.info/>

FileZilla Client
GUI FTP/SFTP/SCP client
<http://filezilla-project.org/>

CDBurnerXP
Lightweight and user-friendly CD/DVD authoring/burning
Now available as an MSI
Get rid of that Roxio/Nero bloatware
<http://cdburnerxp.se/>

ORCA
MSI/MST editor
Not much good for on-the-spot fix-it jobs, but great for deployment engineering
Unfortunately, you have to download the whole damn Windows SDK to get it
<http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa370557(VS.85).aspx>

WinDbg
Windows debugger
Can sometimes tell you what driver causes a STOP bluescreen
<http://www.microsoft.com/whdc/devtools/debugging/installx86.mspx>

  Not really sysadmin things, but worth mentioning:

GIMP
Bitmap/raster graphics editor
Useful for manipulating screen captures
Also for dealing with photos users want something done with
Also pranks
Not as slick as Adobe Photoshop, but a lot cheaper
<http://www.gimp.org/>

Inkscape
Vector graphics editor
Useful for network/equipment diagrams and such
Not as slick as Visio, but a lot cheaper
<http://www.inkscape.org/>

Firefox
Combined with various extensions, best web browser out there
<http://www.mozilla.com/>

-- Ben

~ Finally, powerful endpoint security that ISN'T a resource hog! ~
~ <http://www.sunbeltsoftware.com/Business/VIPRE-Enterprise/>  ~

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